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When he first got out of his hospital bed, Solomon Elimimian's right leg was covered in a cast and his sole mode of transportation was one of those electric scooters favoured by the elderly and the infirm.

That was all right for getting around the house, but a man's got to eat and longer trips in his new ride proved problematic. This meant when hunger struck, Elimimian would text his Lions teammates and have them bring over food from the team's Surrey practice facility.

So he can laugh now. But when you're lying flat on your back, wondering if your career is over, the laughs are a little harder to come by. Elimimian, the CFL's most outstanding player in 2014, has come out the dark side after rupturing his right Achilles tendon in the Lions' seventh game of 2015 and now pronounces himself ready to resume his place as the baddest man in the Canadian game.

That's good news for the Lions and not-so-good news for the rest of the CFL. But if you're wondering how this singular athlete went from puttering around in a scooter to raging around a football field, just stop and consider everything that brought him to this place. Elimimian, it seems, has made a career of overcoming obstacles and, like the mean streets of south-central Los Angeles or disbelieving football coaches, a little thing like a ruptured Achilles wasn't going to defeat him.

"As soon as (Lions team doctor Bob) McCormack said go, it was full speed," Elimimian says. "I wanted to have the fastest recovery ever. Whatever timetable they'd' give me, I'd try to exceed that. That was my goal. Let me get better.

"I researched all the guys who tore their Achilles: (NFL stars) Terrell Suggs, Robert Mathis, Michael Crabtree. How did they come back? What did they do? I saw the finish line. It knew it could be done. But are you going to do the work? That's the question."

In this case, it's a rhetorical one.

Elimimian is now 10 months from the injury that threatened his livelihood and it's hard to reconcile the man who was carried off the field in Hamilton with the man who's been flying around Lions training camp. He looks like the player who obliterated the CFL's single-season record for tackles in 2014. He looks like the player who, with Adam Bighill, formed the league's best linebacking partnership.

Is he still that player? The 29-year-old Elimimian says he won't know for sure until the real work of the regular season begins. But, in the next breath, he says: "I feel as good as I've ever felt and one thing I know is it's going to keep getting better. I don't have any limitations."

You can guess how his colleagues feel about that.

"He's looked good at this camp," said defensive co-ordinator Mark Washington. "He's being himself. A motivated player can be a very dangerous player. Solly's always played with a chip on his shoulder and you want that."

"Energy, passion, physical play, that's what he brings and those are the three things you want in a linebacker," said Bighill. "I missed him when he wasn't there. We feed off each other."

Now they can resume eating.

Elimimian went under the knife in late August but it would be two months before he began his rehab in earnest. Once he ditched the accursed scooter, he made his way back to Los Angeles and began working out the L.A. Galaxy's training facility under the watchful eye of physical therapist Janet Jin.

He would turn his recovery into a competition. And Elimimian lives to compete.

"(Jin) said she's never seen a faster recovery," said Elimimian. "It was hard but I enjoyed it because it tested me.

"My life has always been about challenges. When I came to the Lions I was fourth on the depth chart. I only had one scholarship offer because I was too small for Division I. It brought back that fire and I think that's going to be advantageous for me. You have to have something to drive you."

During his rehab, Elimimian says he shut down most of his contact with the outside world as he went about the dirty work of building back his right leg. But, through it all, one of his teammates continued to reach out to him, continued to let him know he wasn't alone in his fight.

That man stood beside his friend. Now Adam Bighill stands beside him in the Lions defence.

"Biggie knows me and I know him," Elimimiam said. "There was a stretch when I wasn't talking to anybody because I was so focused on what I was doing.

"But he texted me and said: 'I know you're in a cave right now but I love you and I can't wait to play with you again.' "

Soon enough he'll get that chance. He's not the only one who can hardly wait.

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